No Questions Asked
by namewithheld
Summary: Love doesn't mean never having to say you're sorry: love is believing, no questions asked. PG as can be, but this is the stuff of heartbreak


Title: No Questions Asked, Adam

Author: Tote

Rating: PG, my friends, PG

Genre: romance, angst…I'm not much for variety

A/N: This story contains some unfriendly content in the form of a nasty shock where Adam is concerned, so I'm anticipating a few disgusted reviews. Please, be nice! R&R

And there she is, like six shades of beautiful, bathing in the sunlight and oblivious to me. Jane. I watch her smile and I don't know why, I missed the joke.

The others laugh and it's a lazy, warm sound that drifts up in the air like a cloud of smoke. I'm there, loitering in the background with them, but I'm not one of them, not anymore.

Jane slips a strand of hair behind her ear and the gesture, with her hand and her hair and that face, is beautiful.

In a way, she deserves the truth about Bonnie. But how can I look into those eyes and tell her those ugly things? How can I explain the devils inside of me, the needs I had, my sickness? How can I keep from crying when she laughs like that?

She looks over at me, her eyes narrowing suspiciously. "You okay?" she says and her tone is concerned, but guarded. She doesn't want the truth; an angry voice says inside, she wants reassurances.

"Yeah," I snap as the sun makes her hair glow red, "Jane, I'm fine."

"Dude, chill," Grace says and raises her eyebrow at me.

I shrug at her and already feel the stains of regret about Jane: I snapped at her, I made her feel bad. After everything I've done. I clench my hands to resist the urge to grab a pencil and sketch the way her eyes glitter when she's angry, I wish she cared enough to be angry. I remember her sitting up, pushing my hand away: _Adam, no! _

I sigh deeply, ignoring Luke's comment about love being chemical, ignoring love completely because Jane's right there, and she seems lost in thought again. Her eyes are half-closed and she absently bites her bottom lip.

Her skin has been darker lately, the beginnings of a tan that make me want to kiss down her shoulder till I meet the curve of her breast—and we're back where we started: I remember Bonnie's breasts, Bonnie's body.

And it's sad, because I couldn't keep myself in control then and now the image leaves me stone-cold. She was just…a thing, someone for me to use. That's worse than doing it for like's sake. I'm worse than the guy that falls in love with someone else: I'm the guy who thought screwing another girl would make it all go away: the wanting, the needing, the desperation.

I hate myself and I clench my hands again, my eyes going back to her face, her eyes—they've gone suddenly wide.

I catch her like that sometimes. It's like she recognizes something or someone, only no one's there and then she always—

"I gotta go, guys, see you later," she mumbles in a rush, getting up.

just takes off, never looks back.

I watch her head off and I was wrong before, because she did recognize someone. She goes to that guy in the brown jacket I always used to see her with, who smiles at her and when I lean forward, to see her expression, the sun gets in my eyes and she's obscured by the light, leaving me desperately wondering in the shade of the trees.

"Hello, Rove? Earth to planet Rove?" Grace is talking to me. I look at her and she frowns. "You're all spaced out today."

I open my mouth with an excuse, a lie, but I can't, I just can't, so I shrug, "Yeah."

Her eyes flickering knowingly to where Jane and That Guy stand bathing in the light, Grace says quietly, so that Friedman and Luke and Glynis won't hear: "They're not _a thing_ or anything. She's just talking to him."

I feel a wave of old bitterness. "Yeah, 'cause she told you that, right?" I look at Grace, who looks deflated. I shake my head, knowing: "she has so many secrets; you never know what the truth is."

"This from you?" Grace replies and she could be accusing, but she isn't: her voice is cool and matter-of-fact and it only drives her point home: who am I to talk about secrets? I'm the asshole.

Jane leans into the guy, who puts his hands on her elbows to steady her. He says something and I hear her laugh softly. It's enough to make me want to punch the guy, beat him to a pulp, because she isn't his, she isn't his, she isn't his.

But then, she isn't mine, either, is she? Grace's voice echoes in my mind like a stranger's voice: _this from you?_

I feel a sudden jerk of pain in my hand and look down in surprise: all this time I've been slowly, absently digging into my skin with Luke's protractor: I've drawn blood. The redness of it slides down my palm and drips onto the cool cement and I wonder if this is why Mom took pills: to avoid seeing it.

To avoid seeing.

I try to stick my hand in my pocket before anyone sees, but Grace's eyes are quick: "You cut yourself."

Everybody sort of starts talking at once and I stammer: "It's nothing, I'll go to the nurse for a band-aid," even though I know this isn't a band-aid situation and suddenly the pain is stinging up my arm like poison in my system.

Suddenly, they all stop talking at once and look beyond me. I clench my hands involuntarily and bloods seeps out between my fingers, dripping down in all its obviousness and Jane is there behind me, staring at my hand with wide, fearful eyes.

Then the light changes, as she steps toward me and reaches for my wrist, pulling it up to her eyelevel. "Here," she murmurs, eyes meeting mine and then looking away. She unwinds the thin white scarf from her neck.

"No!" I say quickly but she's already bandaging the bloody palm with it, frowning and not meeting my eyes again. But I can't look away.

Even though I know I shouldn't, I can't keep myself from staring at her face, can't keep myself from tasting all that pain all over again because I love her just as much in that moment as I did when I kissed her on the porch, more than that: but there aren't any words to describe how it seems as if the world just started spinning off its axis when she touched the bare skin of my wrist and ruined her scarf to help me.

She tenses, pausing. Slowly, so slowly, her eyes drift up to my mouth and I swallow hard as her eyes go darker, hotter with something I've never seen before and my heart is hammering and I'd kill for her to kiss me—just this once, just for a minute. I want to lean into her, feel her against me but I can't, I can't force myself on her or make her do something she doesn't want, not again. God—Jane, please.

"There," she says, stepping away from me with false cheerfulness as she admires her handiwork: "that should do it, till you get to the nurse's…that should do it." Her voice is so soft.

"Yeah," I agree quickly, "thank you," and my voice is gruff and I pretend the tears in my eyes are from the cut. I try to catch her eye but she turns away and walks out of my sight, around a corner.

"Dude," says Friedman.

_Jane, Jane, Jane. My body screams at me to go faster, to take her and I feel my hands tremble as I kiss her skin: there, by the neck and down, on her collar bone, her shoulder—Jane, you're so beautiful, my Jane. Finally, my hand is on her knee and I run it down her leg, to the heat between her legs where I linger briefly and press down with my thumb through denim and she cries out something and I ignore her, ignore that voice I don't want to hear because it's not what I—and then my fingers are on the buckle and slowly, though my hand is shaking and I can't see straight, it slides apart and I unzip her jeans, breathing in sharply when I see the bare flesh of her stomach, feeling myself brimming with something, something I can't name when I see a scar by her belly button._

_Oh, God. Oh, God. _

"_Adam, come on!" Bonnie whispers and I feel myself go cold at the sound._

"Adam?"

I look up, startled. I'm standing in front of my open locker, hypnotized by memories and it's Jane saying my name, standing there with bag over shoulder in the hallway and smiling. I smile back, and the muscles in my face feel rusty. She's so pretty when she smiles. "Hey," I half-sigh and she bites her lip and looks down.

"I have to ask you for a favor," she says slowly, wringing her hands and keeping her gaze firmly on my face.

"Okay," I agree immediately, because she's asking me for something and I've never wanted to do something for her more: tell me to walk off a cliff, I'll do it, tell me to never look at you again, I'll do whatever you ask me to, Jane. This is my mistake to make up for.

"And I need you to just—" she continues as if not hearing me and half-laughs, half-sobs, "—talk it on faith and do it, no questions asked. Can you do that?"

I nod wordlessly, ready. In a flash, I remember her shy smile when I gave her the rose, the night Judith died.

"Stop working at the paper. Quit your internship." She looks at me steadily, even as tears slip down her face. I know from her quivering lips that she's just waiting for me to let her down again.

I think of the hotel, of Dad's meds, of how much my chances for getting into Rhode Island will get smaller. Then I look at Jane's face.

"Okay," I tell her simply.

She watches me, disbelievingly, I think. "Okay?"

I nod gravely. "Okay."

Jane nods back slowly, absently wiping the tears of her cheeks with the back of her hand. Then, eyes widening, she walks up to me and then all of a sudden, she's like an inch away and I can't breathe, because I taste her breath. _I love you. _"Is your hand okay?" she stage-whispers.

I clear my throat and hold up my hand, now bandaged with actual bandages. "Yeah, it's fine."

She takes my hand in both of hers and I suck in a breath, I hurt with all the things I don't say and when she begins to trace my palm with her gentle fingers, I sigh. Laughing a little, she looks up at me and says: "No stitches?" Playful smile, sad eyes.

"No stitches," I echo. My heart races. We haven't been this close in weeks and yes, I might be about to ruin it. My free hand cups her face. Tensing, she stares at me searchingly. I gently rub my thumb against her temple, wishing I could say something that could explain, wishing anything was good enough. Her eyes close sweetly and her lips part: those lips that I was made to kiss.

I can taste her soft, sweet sighs of breath.

"Jane…" and then my lips are against hers and she doesn't pull away. I'm not breathing. She starts to kiss me back and my heart leaps as I take her bottom lip into my mouth and suck it, feeling her shiver and wanting her beneath me. Then her mouth opens and she releases my hand and I cup her face completely as our tongues touch and tangle, sending desire coursing through us.

Jane, my beautiful Jane.

But she's not mine, anymore, is she? She breaks away, breathing unsteadily and I say the only thing I know to be true in my soul: "I love you."

To my shock, she laughs.

She laughs as she steps back, tears running down her face. "You love me," she repeats hollowly and she sobs through her laughter: "Well, good." Shaking her head, she reaches out and touches my cheek, her eyes filled with age. She reminds me of someone. "So long, Adam Rove."

"But…Jane, where are you—" but she's gone already, and the doors slam shut behind her. The bell rings and I ignore it, I run after her, pushing open the doors and running down the front steps. I call her name into the silent, empty world but she's gone, doing whatever she does. I touch my mouth where she left her mark and muse that they're her secrets: she's Jane, and I'm Adam. I'll wait for her, I'll keep away.

One day she'll trust me not to ask questions.


End file.
